Ferrari catches up with Mercedes
There Mercedes messes up a bit in qualifying and Ferrari is approaching, indicating an encouraging trend that Frederic Vasseur he is keen to underline while explaining that yes, Lewis Hamilton And Charles Leclerc perhaps they won’t have the car to win yet, but that the path is undoubtedly the right one. This is also evident from the gaps, which remain significant but are more than halved compared to the last qualifying sessions of the season, which took place last week in Melbourne. A result, that of the qualifications of the Chinese GP, which leaves a glimmer of hope for the Red team which, considering the powerful sprint shown so far at the start, can aspire to put even more pressure on the poleman in the race Andrea Kimi Antonelli and on the leader of the World Championship, George Russell.
The words of Ferrari boss, Fred Vasseur
“It is difficult to construct a statistic based on just two events – explains Ferrari team principal, Fred Vasseur, to the microphones Sky – but it is true that we are going in the right direction. We were 8 tenths behind in Melbourne, 6 tenths yesterday and 4 tenths today, which means we are on the right track and that there is some convergence of performance. But the Mercedes are still a little bit faster than us on the straight, so we have to keep pushing in this direction. We managed to fight for a couple of laps in the Sprint, let’s try to do something more tomorrow”.
However, there is no concern about the tyres, which in the 19 laps of the 100 km race put all the drivers in difficulty, including Hamilton who after the checkered flag admitted that he had burned his left front with the struggles in the first laps: “It is true, but this morning we had the mediums while we still have a set of Hards and another set of mediums for the race. I think that in the GP things will probably go a little better, also because we know the track better”.
The internal fight in the garage between Hamilton and Leclerc
And then there is the ace up the sleeve of departures: “So far we’ve started well and it’s true that it’s been one of our strong points, though eventually the others will improve too. We are improving in qualifying, they will improve where they are a little weaker than usso we don’t expect to gain three positions in every start throughout the season. But tomorrow we’ll be fine“. However, there were no problems in the Maranello garage after the skirmishes between Leclerc and Hamilton in the Sprint: “You always have to manage this type of situation when there are two cars starting side by side. I think it’s the same for every team and every driver. But they are professionals and I think it’s good for us to have two great riders pushing each other”, concluded Ferrari boss Frederic Vasseur.
